Gujarat seeks review of Supreme Court judgment on lokayukta

Feb 2, 2013, 04.39AM ISTTNN

NEW DELHI: The Gujarat government on Friday moved the Supreme Court seeking review of its January 2 judgment upholding governor Kamala Beniwal's decision to appoint Justice RA Mehta as lokayukta despite objection from chief minister Narendra Modi.

The state cited a subsequent judgment of the apex court, delivered on January 11 in appointment of Karnataka upa-lokayukta and taking a divergent view to give primacy to the CM's recommendation, to request the SC for reconsideration of its January 2 judgment in the Gujarat lokayukta case.

In the Gujarat case, a bench headed by Justice BS Chauhan had assigned primacy of opinion to the chief justice of the high court in the consultation process for appointment of lokayukta.

The review petition filed through advocate EC Agrawala requested a relook at the January 2 judgment, which had laid emphasis on interpretation of Section 3 of the Lokayukta Act so as to confer primacy to the opinion of the chief justice though the said section does not refer to it.

"Later judgment of the Supreme Court seeks to grant an equal status to all the constitutional functionaries involved in the consultation process and while doing so doubts the views expressed in the judgment on Gujarat lokayukta case," the state government said.

The Modi government said the SC had consistently held and accepted as a constitutional principle that the governor was bound to act on the aid and advice of the council of ministers headed by the chief minister.

"In the Gujarat lokayukta appointment, the chief minister never tendered advice to the governor to appoint Justice RA Mehta as lokayukta. On the contrary, the council of ministers/CM gave reasons as to why Justice Mehta could not be appointed as lokayukta," it said.

It said the scheme of both the Karnataka and Gujarat legislation was identical yet the two judgments — one on January 2 on Gujarat and the other on January 11 on Karnataka — were diametrically opposite warranting a reconciliation of constitutional principle.

Modi had written to the chief justice of the HC pointing out the non-suitability of Justice Mehta for lokayukta post because he was over 75 years old, associated with NGOs and social activists antagonistic to the BJP government, had expressed views against the government at seminars and conferences and held a biased perception of the government.

The SC had rejected these objections and said these did not disqualify Justice Mehta from being appointed as lokayukta.